Peripheral Visions: Coulda Woulda Shoulda

Peripheral Visions: They coalesce in the soft blur of darkest shadows and take shape in the corner of your eye. But you won't see them coming... until it's too late.

Coulda Woulda Shoulda

"Well, it sucks," Leto said.

"Language," I said. "Your mom doesn't like that word."

"I know, but everyone says it."

"Not you, mijo," I told him.

Leto just shrugged. Then he resumed his complaint. "Felix says that things are horrible for people like him over there. It's not right they're trying to send him back."

I studied the contours of the board I was shaping. It wasn't right. The board was going to be part of a custom-made chair, and its curve and angle had to be comfortable. The woman who had commissioned the chair was paying enough that it should fit her like a dream.

At the same time, I was considering how best to reassure Leto. The Stringence Party liked to make a show of their commitment to tradition and "old-time values," and for the sake of those values alone they should have been ardent champions of cross-dimensional immigration. After all, ours was the nation that had made democracy safe for the world, at least twice over, and it had always been a nation of immigrants.

On the other hand, it was also an historical truth that the most recent wave of immigrants tend to veer toward conservative political positions. Maybe there's a little bit of competition in there: A "finder's keepers" mentality, an "I got mine" sense of victory that means less if the doors to newcomers remain open.

The current slate of anti-immigration legislation was more odious than anything that had come before, I thought, because it was aimed specifically at denying oppressed and persecuted people the succor and shelter we could easily have offered them. Worse, the politicians behind the bills were trading in antiquated... but still virulent... prejudices, hurling the word "trans" at the migrants and refugees who sought safety in our universe.

The way they hammered on that word – "trans" – triggered a visceral shock for people my age who remember how transgender people used to be demonized. For anyone who isn't a half-wit, it was distasteful, too, because it was deliberate conflation with those earlier culture wars. The immigrants the new proposals took aim at were actually transgenic – part big cat, most of them, though some transgenic people were engineered to borrow genetically from sea creatures or other forms of hominid life.

Friends and family call me cynical, but even I was startled every time I read in the newsfeeds about how many people didn't know the difference between "trans" as it was used decades ago, – in those earlier waves of legislative persecution – as opposed to now.

"The kids in class are bullying him all the time now, and they never used to," Leto said. "Everyone used to think it was cool that he's part tiger. Now they call him all sorts of names and ask if he's housebroken."

I sighed. I remembered, too, how conservatives had once made a national scandal out of the ridiculous claim that schools were allowing young students to identify as "cat gender," and use litterboxes instead of restrooms. I'd been shocked back then at how juvenile elected leaders and media hosts could be – and how gullible their followers were.

Of course, the same demographics gave rise to suicidal UFO cultists, so maybe I shouldn't have been surprised.

"The teacher doesn't even stop them," Leto said. "In fact, she insults Felix all the time, just like the mean kids do. I think she's afraid of being called 'woke' and getting fired."

I suppressed a sigh. Another resurgence of the idiocy we'd thought we'd left behind.

"Well, Leto, it's good that you're concerned for your friend," I told him, keeping vitriol over the latest political reversals to myself.

"It's not enough to be concerned," my nephew told me, fire in his voice. "You have to stand up to stuff like that!"

For all that the world – o'erstuffed with fools, as Shakespeare once wrote – appalls me, my nephew never failed to give me hope for the future. He was only twelve, and yet he was impervious to bullshit of every sort, and courageous to boot.

"And did you know," Leto added, "that migrants get robbed and blackmailed? Even by the police! Most of them won't report it when they're beaten up because the police will just take their money."

"Same tune, different words," I mumbled, wielding the chisel and shaving the barest sliver off the board. Now it was perfect.

"What did they ever do to deserve any of this?" Leto asked me. "The kids all say that people like Felix are dangerous because they're part animal, but human beings are just animals, too. I read it in one of my mom's old biology books."

I hoped that my sister-in-law wasn't leaving material like that lying out for any random morality check to discover.

"But the kids say their parents warned them that Felix might bite them or scratch them up," Leto said. "And he doesn't even have claws!"

I nodded.

"I don't think people from other universes who come here are violent or dangerous at all. If they were, they'd stay home instead of coming here, because it sounds to me like the people in their home universes are the violent ones," Leto proclaimed.

"Well," I said, "I think that's often true. What do your parents say?"

"My dad says I should ask you for some perspective."

I paused in my work and looked at Leto. He was eyeing me with genuine curiosity: This was what he'd been angling at all along.

"Okay," I said. "But what make him think I have any different perspective to give?"

"He says you met a southerner once."

This confused me. A southerner?

"Oh," I said, realizing. "You mean a sojourner. That's what we used to call them before we started calling them migrants or refugees."

"So? Did you?" Leto asked. He's smart: He knew there was a story there, and if the adults were being so coy about it, it had to be a good one.

I set the chisel down. "If I tell you, will help me with the varnishing?"

"Then I'll have to wear the gas mask," he complained.

"Air filter," I corrected. "And that's the price of admission, kid."

Leto pretended to think about it, but I could see he was excited to hear the story. "Okay," he said, not even pretending to be grudging about it.

I turned to the worktable with its drawers and cubbies, and got out two air filters, two brushes, and a tin of varnish. The chair was still in pieces, but they would fit together as perfectly as a 3D jigsaw puzzle, so I felt confident about doing the varnishing now rather than waiting for the chair to be assembled, which would make the task of varnishing that much more unwieldy.

Once we were ready to go, I pried open the tin. "So," I said, my voice muffled by the filter, "it was a long time ago..."

***

I was twenty-eight, and my younger brother, Jayden, was twenty. We were trying to be business partners, importing rugs, tchotchkes, and small furnishings.

We were in our shop that morning. I don't remember exactly what we were doing when the sojourner came in. We were arguing – that much I recall; not screaming, but bickering, picking at each other, and not in a fun way. It was probably the same old fight all over again: We both wanted to be the one to travel and acquire, not the one who had to stay in the U.S. and deal with bookkeeping and bills and customers. I like travel because I like being in other cultures; it's stimulating. Jayden liked travel because he could find weed, get stoned, and not be stimulated, except by beautiful women.

Don't get me wrong. I love my brother, and if weren't for him I might be dead now. But still: heteros.

Jayden saw him first, and from the way he suddenly stopped talking and his eyes darted between the newcomer and myself and then back again, I knew he was surprised... maybe even frightened.

I turned around and saw why. The man was my identical twin. In fact, Jayden told me later, for a moment he thought the guy was my twin, separated at birth, and his mind was racing. Was this going to be some sort of emotional reunion? What would it mean for our family?

In fact, I was thinking something along the same lines when I caught sight of the man. But then I stopped wondering about a possible family tie and started worrying about the gun he pulled out of his pocket and aimed at my face.

***

"Wait a minute!" Leto cried. "Why would you have a twin brother?"

"I tell him I had a gun shoved in my gob... and this is what he seizes on," I complained.

Leto rolled his eyes at me, and I rolled my eyes right back at him.

"Well, it could have been true," I told him. "He might have been my twin. It happens. I was adopted, you know."

"You were adopted?" Leto cried, as if he hadn't known at all. Maybe he hadn't?

"Of course I was," I told my nephew. "So was your dad. You didn't know that?"

Leto was silent for a moment, then he said, "I knew about my dad... I just never thought you were adopted, too."

"Our parents couldn't have kids of their own," I said. "And now's a good time to switch tracks for a minute and tell you why I was adopted."

"What about the guy with the gun?"

Nice to know he cared.

"Well, this has to do with him, too... sort of," I said.

"How?"

"Will you let me tell the story?" I asked.

***

My dad – my biological dad, I mean – threw me into a table when I was four. Well, he didn't throw me, exactly, but he did drop me, and he did it on purpose. I landed on my feet, but stumbled to the side, crashed into the table, and bit through my upper lip. There was blood all over the place; I remember my dad taking me into the bathroom, running cold water, pressing a washcloth to my mouth. I remember him holding me up, bizarrely, so I could see my own bleeding lip in the mirror, with blood flowing down and dripping onto my shirt.

I remember my parents taking me to the emergency room, where I had to get stitches, which hurt like hell... so bad, I couldn't even scream. Pain that wasn't even pain, but a neon light that flashed and buzzed and blinded me. When that light flared, an intense itching sensation of filled my entire body. It was pain on another level.

"Just hold still," I remember the doctor saying just before the neon light would flare again, filling me with what felt like fire under my skin. Three times he said it; I needed three stitches.

Afterwards, holding a cold rag (or maybe it was an ice pack?) to my swollen face, my shirt still bloody, I remember the doctor asking me how the accident had happened. Had it even been an accident? – he asked.

Behind him, I saw my parents watching me. They had told me that I'd be asked this. They had told me to lie and say I was running and slipped and careened into the table. They didn't threaten me; they just told me it was very important that I tell this story, even though it wasn't true.

But they had threatened me about lying before, many times, and I was terrified of not telling the truth. I hesitated, not sure how to answer, and in that moment... did it really happen? Or is it a figment of memory, something I made up over the years?... in that moment I saw the two different paths my life might take. There was screaming and terror and more blood in store if I went one way... and there was something else – safety, peace – if I went the other way.

I chose safety and peace. I told the doctor the truth: "My dad dropped me and I fell on the table."

"He dropped you?" The doctor was leaning over, hands on his knees, speaking to me on my level. Now he leaned in closer. "Why?"

Behind him, my parents no longer looked like they were encouraging me. They looked like... they looked like black storm clouds, full of lightning. Now I know that it was fear they were feeling – fear of losing me? I'd like to think so – but at the time I thought it was rage. I stepped forward into the doctor's arms, looking for harbor against the storm they represented. "I asked my dad to pick me up and he did., but then he dropped me," I said.

I think the doctor had more questions, but I didn't hear them. I clung to his leg, his hand on my back, and I heard him asking things of my parents. The one thing I recall clearly was him asking my dad if he was drunk, which, of course, he was.

***

"What happened then?" Leto asked, his eyes wide.

"There was a nice lady, and there was a man who acted nice... though he was kind of creepy, and I wouldn't let him near me. Then the nice lady was back. Then there was... I don't know. I had to stay in this place with a bunch of other kids. I don't know how long I was there. I was scared, and I missed my parents, and I was pissed off at that doctor."

Leto was too enthralled to call me out on my language. I was relieved when he didn't notice.

"Why were you mad at the doctor? He saved you."

"No, he didn't. He told me he would; he told me he'd keep me safe. He looked nice, and I believed him. But then he turned me over to a whole bunch of strangers. I would rather have been home again, even with my parents."

"Did they hurt you?"

"My parents? Obviously. The strangers? No. But they... let's just say, I was work for them. Not a child, not their child. Just more work."

Neither of us spoke for a moment. The brushes slathered varnish. Leto was handling his brush with some skill; he'd helped with this before, and he was good at it.

"So, anyway," I said. "I think I remember being in court... in a room with a lot of wood, wooden walls, wooden tables and benches like church pews. Like you see in the movies. But I'm not sure. Maybe what I'm remembering are scenes from the movies. There had to be a court proceeding in there someplace, but I'm not sure I was part of it. And there was a lot of feeling cold and lonesome, and I remember some of the kids being nice and some of them being mean, but they mostly they were scared, like I was. And the nice lady – I remember her. She was there a lot, telling us we were safe now, and it would all be okay, but it didn't feel safe. It felt like it does when you're trying not to lose your footing on a rock face and fall off."

"Like when I broke my arm," Leto said.

"Right."

"I was so scared, but I didn't think I'd really fall," Leto said. "But then I did. It really hurt, but I was too surprised to cry. And also, I got the wind knocked out of me, and I couldn't breathe for a minute."

"Well, it was kind of like that," I told him. "But for a long time. But eventually this nice woman came in with her husband, and they told me they'd like to be my parents."

"Grandma and grandpa?" Leto asked.

"That's right," I told him. "They took me home. They loved me. I loved them right away because for the first time in my life I felt safe – really safe. Like Felix probably felt when he first got here, before people turned mean."

"Yeah," Leto said. Then he asked: "What happened then?"

"Well, then, they adopted me, and we had a party to celebrate. And then we moved to Connecticut. And just a couple months before I turned eight, they left me with their friend Louise, who was really funny, and she and I baked banana bread. And when my parents came home, they brought a newborn baby with them and told me he was my brother."

"That was my dad!" Leto exclaimed. "He told me they were there when he was born."

"That's right," I said, laughing because I couldn't help myself: "I thought that was how everyone got younger siblings – their parents went off to the baby store, and picked one out!

***

Fast-forward twenty years. A man who looked exactly like me was jamming a gun in my face, and in the back of my mind – insanely – I was cracking a joke: Well, this is a novel way to commit suicide...

Jayden, behind me, was yelling at the man with the gun. (I didn't repeat his exact language while describing the scene to Leto; he would definitely have called me out on language.)

I don't know what I said at that moment; probably something like, "What the hell!" Maybe something like "What do you want?" I'd like to think I said, "Make my day, punk!" – still a classic line – but I suspect I probably said something more along the lines of, "Oh my god, please don't hurt me."

What I do remember is what the stranger said to me: "Are you gay?"

This was the last thing I expected to hear... not because gay bashing was uncommon; it was more and more common at the time, thanks to politicians and preachers spreading lies about gay people, saying that we were dangerous to children and we spread disease. But when a man who could be your identical twin pulls a gun on you, "Are you gay?" simply isn't the obvious question.

"You're a goddamn faggot!" the man screamed. "Aren't you!"

That's when Jayden – who's always been more of a scrapper then me (though again, I didn't tell Leto this; Jayden has asked me more than once not to regale my nephew with tales of his hell-raising exploits, because... and I totally get this... he doesn't want to encourage his son's natural rambunctiousness and have to deal with the headaches it would cause) – anyway, that's when Jayden stepped forward and reached out, quickly and cleanly, to try to take the gun from the stranger. It was absolutely foolish, and beautifully brave, and the man was pointing the gun at my brother in an instant, and that's when I lost my shit. I'd been startled and scared when the gun was on me, but threaten my brother and I will fucking kill you.

Whatever happened next took only a few seconds, and it was a total blur until suddenly I had the stranger on the floor and his gun was in my hand. I whipped him across the face with the gun – two, three times. His cheek opened up with a gash far nastier than the one I had when I was four and bit through my lip. I was about to hit him again when I realized he was not resisting me; he was staring up at me in a frozen, wild terror.

I wasn't holding he gun the right way to fire it. I corrected that oversight in a hurry and jammed the barrel into one of his nostrils. "Tell me right now who you are and what this is about," I snarled, only it came out a little differently than I intended: It sounded more like, "What the fuck!"

My brother was talking to me, but I couldn't understand what he was saying. Staring into the stranger's eyes, I knew – absolutely knew – that he really was me. Not a twin; not a lookalike. He was me, but he was a sojourner – a traveler from a parallel universe. They'd started appearing about two years before. Usually they were peaceful – tourist of a sort; curiosity seekers who wanted to see how their lives might have turned out if they had made different choices, or had different choices to make. Only rarely was there violence involved with a sojourner's visit.

For what felt like minutes, I studied his face. It was probably only a few seconds, but it was enough for me to take note of the scar on his upper lip – the scar where he... where I... had bitten right through, upon impacting with that damn table all those years ago.

He was me, if I'd taken the other path and told the lie my parents had asked me to.

"Hey, hey, now, hey," Jayden was saying. I registered his words because they weren't addressed to me, and they sounded freaked out.

A hand fell gently, but firmly, on my shoulder. "I think you've won the fight," a new voice said.

I looked up – at my own face, yet again my own eyes, my own smile, and – in yet another echo from the past – that same goddamn scar on the upper lip.

I jumped up and stepped back from both of my doppelgängers in a hurry. "What the fuck!" I demanded, though again it came out differently than I intended – sort of a breathless gasp, no real words at all.

The newcomer had his foot on the stranger's chest and was pinning him to the floor. "You've caused a real ruckus," he told the stranger, who looked up at him with a vicious expression on his face – pure fury, and pure hatred.

Now yet another man stepped forward – not another version of me, thank god. He was stocky and looked strong, and he had red hair and a coppery growth of beard stubble on his handsome face. I'd never seen him before, but a felt a lightning strike of instant recognition.

What the actual hell was going on? That was the only thought in my head, as I tried to piece events together.

The ginger didn't return my shocked stare; he was dealing with the bloody-faced sojourner, reaching down and grasping him roughly. "On your feet," the ginger growled, "and, swear to god, don't make me bust you in the chops or you'll have even more new scars to show for it."

The sojourner didn't say anything; he rose unsteadily, and the ginger helped prop him up as he swayed, as if he were dizzy.

The stranger was trying to get my attention. Finally, I looked at him.

"I'm sorry about all of this, Danny," he said. Then: "Danny?"

I shook my head. "Leon," I told him. "My parents changed my name when they adopted me."

The stranger nodded. "Okay. Leon." He held out a hand. It took me a moment to decide to take it. "So, I'm Danny," he said.

"Okay," I said, staring at the stranger the same way I'd stared at the sojourner's battered face a moment ago. His life, too, was what mine would have been if I'd told that lie all those years ago... but then something different had happened later on, something to differentiate him from the gun-toting sojourner.

"He's Danny, too," the stranger said, nodding at the sojourner, who was pale as a sheet and looking like he might fall to the floor again at any moment.

"And I'm Russell," the ginger put in. "His husband." Russell nodded at Danny. Good Danny, that is, not evil Danny, who like a rag doll in Russell's grip.

"And you're wondering what the hell is going down right now," the stranger... good Danny... said.

I nodded, not knowing what to say.

"This piece of shit – " Good Danny nodded at Evil Danny. " – has been transiting across realities, tracking down gay versions of himself and killing them – or, trying to kill them, anyway. This isn't the first time he's gotten a beat down. Russell thrashed him good a few months ago when he tried to take me out. He's been thwarted more often than not since then, but he's always managed to get away – until now." Good Danny looked at my brother and then me. "You and your friend here make a good team."

"Jayden," my brother said.

"My brother," I said.

A startled look came across Good Danny's face. He was seeing what his own different choices would have led to, as well. "Is he," Good Danny said. "Well, pleased to meet you... both of you."

"So," Jayden said, "you guys are..." He looked at me, then at the Dannys. "You guys are sojourners?"

"He's a criminal," Good Danny said, jerking a thumb at Evil Danny, who was almost unconscious on his feet. He'd have crumpled already if Russell hadn't been holding onto him. Or maybe he was faking it? He had to be slick, if he'd been evading capture across so many different realities. "Some kind of homophobic, self-hating mission killer."

Evil Danny perked up at that. "I'm not 'self-hating,'" he protested,. "I'm not some filthy faggot like you two. I'm righteous." His burst of energy was already fading. "Righteous," he muttered, his voice weak.

"So righteous, he's trying to kill the gay out of himself by killing all his gay alter-egos," Good Danny said, contempt in his voice.

"Has he ever found a straight version of himself?"

"Not since I've been chasing him, he hasn't," Good Danny said. Russell, his grip never slackening, grinned at that, and he looked at me – and I saw something in his shift. He knew me too, somehow, and not just because I was his husband's double.

Good Danny spoke up again. "I know this is a lot, and I'm sorry we can't stick around to talk about it with you, answer your questions..." He reached up and touched the scar on his upper lip. "I wish we had time to discuss the stories of our lives. But this insane killer has got to be delivered to justice before he finds some new way to slip the noose. And.." Good Danny smirked. "...from the look of him, he'd gonna need medical attention, too, if he's to stay alive long enough to get that justice."

"I'm just fine, asshole," Evil Danny slurred unconvincingly. I'd probably concussed him pretty badly.

Good Danny grabbed Evil Danny, and Russell let him have the bloodied sojourner. Good Danny marched Evil Danny toward the store's front entrance. I wondered vaguely where they were going. How did they transit between universes? Was there some kind of fixed portal? Was that where they were going? Or did they have a device of some sort that would whisk them away? In that case, why do it out on the street? Why not here, inside the store?

Russell drew my attention back to him. He had paused, and was hesitating, half turned toward me.

"Did we ever meet... here?" he asked.

"No," I said. "But all the same, I feel as if..."

"Yeah," Russell said, nodding.

A moment passed between us.

"Rusty, we gotta go," Good Danny called back, navigating his half-unconscious prisoner through the shop door.

I gave Russell an amused look.

"He's the only one who calls me that," Russell grinned. "Well... except for, you know, whoever else in the many universes might also call me... other versions of me... that." We held each other's gazes for a moment more, and then he turned and followed the Dannys through the door.

I didn't follow them. Jayden and I talked for hours about what we should do next... report what had happed to the cops? Call a news feed and share the story? In the end we decided to keep it to ourselves.

***

"Except you're telling me now," Leto said.

"Well, we've told a few people here and there over the years," I said. "It makes a good story."

"So why did my dad want you to tell me about it?"

I shrugged. Knowing my brother, it was just because he thought it was the sort of story that should be kept alive in the family... but maybe only among the males. He has a strange and rather sexist sense of chivalry, and part of it was, I think, his sense that the story belonged more to me than him, so I should be the one to tell it. "Maybe it's just because it shows how sad it is when people get really fucked up for no reason – just because they're not allowed to be who they are."

"Language!" Leon cried gleefully.

"Aw, durn it!" I said.

Leto held out a hand. "Ten dollars, please."

"What! I never charged you for your little slip-up."

"That's because mine was a free word and yours costs. Yours is the worst!"

Only because, I thought, my sister-in-law ranked it that way. I handed my nephew a bill and winked at him. "Don't tell your mom."

***

Years passed. Leto turned fourteen and started thinking more about girls. One day he asked if I as waiting for my own version of Russell – if that was why I was single.

I admitted that maybe that was the case, but it wasn't Russell I was waiting for. I wanted to meet someone with whom I'd share that deep, instantaneous sense of a bond with... that sense of recognition. It had just never happened again.

"I used to think that I just never met my other half, and that he had to be out there somewhere," I told my nephew. "Now I know that's exactly right. He does exist... at least, in some other version of reality. Does he exist here? How would I ever know?" Once I got started, I couldn't stop: "I mean, the thing is... I'd be with Russell right now... if I'd told that life. If I'd stayed with my biological parents."

"And let them beat you up? Turn you into a twisted killer like that evil Danny guy?"

"They say that love hurts," I told him, trying to make a joke of it. "Maybe that's the price you have to pay to earn such happiness."

Leto shook his head. "I don't like that. My mom and dad didn't have to suffer. And if you had stayed with your parents... even if you did manage to find Russell... you wouldn't have been my uncle."

I saw how that thought hurt him. I saw how my selfishness words made him question me.

"Oh, mijo." I rested a hand on his shoulder. "Don't you ever worry that I'd trade you for anything. You, your mom and dad, my whole family... I wish I'd found Russell, but I can't regret how things turned out."

"Don't worry, Uncle Leon," my nephew told me, looking grave and sincere. "Some day your Russell will show up."

And a couple of years later, he did. Leto was sixteen; he'd started doing more work in my shop, and he'd started asking for real money to do it because he wanted to buy a car. "Girls like cars," he said.

"You like cars," I told him, but agreed to his requested wages and started letting him take commissions for bespoke pieces. He was skilled enough – he was more than skilled enough. I like to say I taught him everything he knows, but the truth is I taught him everything I know, and he picked up the rest from... well, god knows there. Echoes bouncing between the many universes, maybe.

Leto was there the day Russell... my Russell... walked into the shop. He saw it almost as soon as I did – almost as soon as Russell did. He saw it, because he saw the two of us recognize each other, saw the instant spark and certainty between us.

"I'm gonna go take a break now," Leto said, smiling, as he slipped away.

"Lazy boy," I told Russell, smiling, half out of my mind with excitement and trepidation. Of course, he didn't know me... didn't know I'd already met a version of him, already knew how well matched we'd be, if we were anything like our alternate selves in some other reality.

Which, of course, we were. I mean, it's logical, right?

"I'm... I'm Russell," the handsome red-haired man, the man I'd been waiting for all my life, told me. Then he added, "But if you want, you can call me..."

"Rusty," we said together, and then we both laughed.

The smiles have never left our faces since that moment – my smile marked with an old scar, and his shiny with copper stubble.

Next week we take another glance into times past and timeless possibilities to see how two old friends become enemies... and two longtime enemies find their way back to friendship when they "Take the Long Way Home."